[jmo531]

Senate Passes Parity: House Action Needed

September 19, 2007

Last night, the U.S. Senate passed the Mental Health Parity Act of 2007 (S 558), legislation requiring health plans to cover treatment for mental illness on the same terms and conditions as all other illnesses. The bill now moves to the House, where efforts are underway to move it forward later this fall.

NAMI would like to express appreciation to the sponsors of S 558 – Senators Pete Domenici (R-NM), Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) and Mike Enzi (R-WY) – for their persistence and leadership in bringing parity legislation forward. NAMI also thanks all our grassroots members whose efforts have made this victory possible. We now need to ask you help again, to push parity through the House.

Action Required
The parity bill now moves to the House for consideration: Contact your member of Congress and urge them to support immediate House passage of S 558 so that the bill can be sent to the President. You can also send a letter to your Senators thanking them for supporting mental illness parity. Contact your Senators and Representative now using NAMI's Legislative Action Center.

Click here to view additional background information on S 558


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NAMI E-News Alerts are electronic newsletters provided free of charge as a public service. With more than 1,100 state and local affiliates, NAMI is the nation's largest grassroots organization dedicated to improving the lives of people with severe mental illnesses. Contributions to support our work can be made online.

If you do not wish

[(JD)]

Hey jmo!

[jmo531]

(((((Sky)))))

Hiya


I like to pop in every now and then.

I have been trying to keep myself pretty busy. Been taking some online college courses, working part-time and continuing my efforts of research of Straight and like programs.

I have been feeling down lately, but I am hanging in there.

Sky

[__zh]

thank you for this valuable info for any citizen of the USA. this matters. this matters a lot. anyone who has come up against the bs of insurance limiting mental health treatment knows how overdue this bill is.

guess we've got some snail mail letters to write for the House vote this fall. seems we're sending more letters to reps and senators than we used to but at least it is democracy in action. e-mail, snail mail, phone calls.........whatever it takes to get our voices heard about this issue! (any other issues close to our heart)

thank goodness for the hard work many have done to get S 558 this far. now let's see it through to completion!

thanks for update on this jmo.

[jmo531]

Thanks Zh,

Things of this nature are very personal to me. I work in healthcare and it is my job to obtain payment from the insurance companies for our physicians. In this process I see the stunts that insurance companies pull to get out of payment of their members claims. It's sick.

For far too long these insurance companies have been raking in the cash year after year, all the while raising our premiums.

Have you ever noticed the hoops one must jump through to get "authorization" from your insurance company to see a therapist. People get fed up with the obstacles and just end up paying for it out of pocket to avoid the frustration. It's very sad.

I am one of those people. My health insurance requires "pre-authorization" for my AD's (Effexor XR). Their reasoning behind this is because it's expensive, so they want me to use a drug from their "preferred list" so it saves them a buck, their not concerned at all that I am highly sensative to medications and I already PAXIL and it made me brain numb for 2 weeks.

Sorry, I get to rambling and there is no stopping me

There is a web site that I visit frequently to write my representative at www.congress.org

This web site allows you to enter in your zip code and send your letters via email to all of your respresentatives at once, and you have the choice to include "Dubya" as well.

I recently received a response back regarding one of the letters I wrote to my local delegate. I was very excited to get that letter. I felt like my issues were being heard.

Back to the point of the thread. It is very important that we get this bill passed.

Thanks,

Jen

> on the same terms and conditions as all other illnesses.

i wonder what this means???

does it mean... drug treatment?

therapy isn't a treatment for non-mental disorders - is it?

is that what is meant by 'parity'?

not sure...

[(JD)]

I think it means you get to see a doctor (therapist) for as long as you have the problem and need treatment, just like for a broken leg or for pneumonia or asthma or kidney disease. You aren't limited to the number of times you see an MD, so you won't be limited in the number of times to see a therapist?

[__zh]

NAMI's (National Alliance on Mental Illness): Parity--Understanding the Issue

this page contains info on how to contact one's Senators or Representatives (for those in USA): link

NAMI's State Mental Health Parity Laws 2007
along with definitions of types of law

to read actual text of bill LOC site has info:
enter bill number S 558 into search box
~~~~~~~~~~~~
additional info plugging NAMI as they're a helpful org. for many what is NAMI and what do they do?

hmm... i predict radical reorganisation of DSM (including dumping some conditions) in the near future...

goodie.

some use for debate about 'what constitutes a mental disorder' after all

:-)

e.g., addiction...
sociopathy...
pedophilia...

[__zh]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
alexandra_k said:
hmm... i predict radical reorganisation of DSM (including dumping some conditions) in the near future...

goodie.

some use for debate about 'what constitutes a mental disorder' after all

:-)

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post"> ak dear...'nother thread 'nother time please. thanks!

sorry, didn't realise this thread was reserved for dancing and the like. wasn't my comment related to implications of parity? i don't see how it was off topic... you can ignore my posts if they aren't to your tastes... thanks.

[__zh]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
alexandra_k said:
sorry, didn't realise this thread was reserved for dancing and the like.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post"> is there some clog dancing going on? </font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
wasn't my comment related to implications of parity? i don't see how it was off topic... you can ignore my posts if they aren't to your tastes... thanks.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post"> this thread is about current status of senate bill which could affect state parity laws dealing w/ insurance and medical coverage....not a let's discuss DSM and what goes where........our interpretation? an update for the voting population and those interested in how legislation affects mental health treatment coverage.

as a person who has dealt directly w/ unequal coverage or limited coverage by insurance companies for mental health we view this as a very positive step for the US Congress to move toward parity. if the bill lists the nitty gritty of categorization and dissection of DSM then we apologize as we've not yet read full text of S 558.

well... one consequence of the senate bill is that people may be convered for more health care... another consequence is that there will be much more controversy over whether any condition constitutes a mental health disorder or not (whether it will be covered by the parity laws). i don't understand how the second issue is more unrelated than the first...

[jmo531]

My purpose of this post was to inform.

There is no doubt we have a long way to go in this fight, but things do not happen over night.

There are already standards by insurance companies of what they consider "mental health/Behavioral health".

I can tell you that currently, my health insurance allows only 20 visits per year for mental health related issues. This type of "CAP" that insurance companies place on the benefit limitations for mental health are rediculous. It is not about the mental wellness of the patients/members. It is about the insurance company not wanting to PAY for such services.

It is high time that the insurance companies recognize mental illness as a real illness.

Baby steps.

[jmo531]

I also wanted to say that if the bill gets passed (still more approval to be done).

If I am understanding what your saying, and please correct me if I am wrong.

Are you thinking that this legislation will prompt insurance companies to change their policies on what they consider mental health to avoid having to cover such services?

I would think that the insurance companies would have a hell of a time "changing their minds" on what they would consider mental health related services. For years they have classified mental health as non physical ailment (for the most part), depression, anxiety, PTSD, BPD, etc, etc, etc.

If they were to change their existing policies regarding mental health to exclude such coverage all together will in my opinion, leave themselves open for lawsuits.

Does what I am saying make any sense?

[wickedwings]

i'm hoping this new law will help me get coverage for a treatment i've been needing, but my insurance keeps refusing.... i need vns therapy (vagus nerve stimulation - www.vnstherapy.com). anyway, i keep having to fight with them, and i'm sure they hate me. i need treatment, period.

hey there. yes, what you are saying makes a lot of sense :-)

who decides what conditions count as mental disorders? at the end of the day... the American Psychiatric Association decides whether a condition will be listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders or not.

E.g., 'homosexuality'. Used to be in there. Not in there anymore. 'pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder'. Not in there. Currently being investigated, however, might get to be in the next edition.

there is a lot of pressure on the American Psychiatric Association with respect to what conditions get to be in there. They are required to JUSTIFY their decisions. Lobby group pressure is a major driving force in the American Psychiatric Association's decisions. Homosexuality was removed because of lobby group pressure from gay rights activists. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder was included because of lobby group pressure from war vets. Bentall refers to both of these as a 'triumph of the doctrine of truth by agreement'. The idea is that... Including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual legitimated the suffering of war vets and enabled them to receive treatment (though not under parity, of course!)

When a condition is recognised by being included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual it becomes a focus of attention for researchers to study the nature, progression, causes, effective treatments etc. It also becomes a focus of research funds. More research funds are available for people to study DSM recognised conditions (such as PTSD) than non-recognised conditions (e.g., 'sub-threshold bi-polar or premenstrual dysphoric disorder). The more conditions are listed in the DSM the more the prevalence of mental disorder goes up in the population. The American Psychiatric Association needs to be careful... If they start saying that prevalence of mental disorder is 100% or 99% or 85% then that would be too hard to credit. Criteria for diagnostic categories are often tweaked in an attempt to adjust prevalence rates to something more credible (for example the tightening up of the 'dissociative identity disorder' criterion by reinstatement of the amnesia requirements in order to try and curb the 'epidemic' that some people were finding a little hard to credit).

Drug companies are another lobby group pressure on the American Psychiatric Association. That kind of lobby group pressure is beneficial to the American Psychiatric Association, as is the lobby group pressure of war vets etc. The development of (I think it was) xanax as a (relatively) successful treatment for a certain sub-set of people with anxiety led to 'Panic Attacks' being recognised as a particular kind of disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. Everybody likes a success story and part of the reason for including this as a seperate condition is that psychiatry now gets to claim this as a success story - here is a condition that we have relatively successful treatment for! See - we are just like medicine!

I forsee that the parity act will result in the health insurance companies becoming a major source of lobby group pressure on the American Psychiatric Association. It will be in the health insurance companies interests to have conditions (especially conditions with expensive treatments) removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual.

Why? Because my guess is that mental health parity will only apply to conditions that appear in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. It thus becomes CRUCIAL what conditions are included and what conditions are excluded.

I've heard that there is a lot of talk about removing 'Personality Disorders' from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders? Is this totally unrelated to the parity act? I think not...

The development of 'rapid cycling bi-polar' and 'bi-polar II' are picking up the slack of reluctance to diagnose 'borderline personality disorder'. I'm just saying that I think the parity laws will result in health insurance companies being a major driving force in the revision of subsequent editions of the DSM. It wouldn't surprise me if it ended up being cost effective for insurance companies to employ scientists to test (and attempt to undermine) the efficacy of treatments. Could be an interesting counter-force to the drug company studies and the studies run by psychologists where both seek to establish the efficacy of their treatments...

Psychologists and psychiatrists and drug companies (and the consumers who believe they need them) might well need to pull together!